Except he’d look absolutely mad massacring his own eardrum with blood exploding down the side of his face. He had to sit still. He had to get through this.
Lunch hour meant the torments of the dining hall, but at least he’d be back with Thomas. Andrew fell in behind a few students talking loudly about the vine infestation and if their parents should be paying the school’s hefty tuition when “all these accidents keep happening.” He decided to slip down a shadowy side hallway and wait for them to pass—except there were two students lingering at the far end, close enough for clandestine whispers. Or kisses. Wickwood had many narrow little hallways like this, relics from the days when servants needed swift access where they wouldn’t disturb the lord of the manor. Art hung on the walls in tarnished gold frames, each piece darker than the last. Apples with dull black skin, bowls of grapes furred with mold, plums split open and oozing soft, spoiled innards. He could almost smell it, the sweet decay of fruit dripping from ancient canvas.
An uncanny crawling sensation prickled up his neck, and he started to back away from the narrow hall when one of the students raised their voice in an unmistakable razor-sharp snap.
“… take a freaking second to think about what you’re doing to him.”
Andrew pressed himself against the art frames and went still as he listened. Lana stood with fists clenched and body taut as she bore down on the slouched figure of Thomas leaning against the wall. He had his arms folded, his mouth at a sour angle, but for once he wasn’t trying to escape her. That was the confusing part.
“I’m not doing anything to him.” Thomas’s voice held less of the usual acid he leveled at Lana, and instead he just sounded annoyed. And tired.
“Well, doesn’t look like it from here. Looks like you made your move when he’s clearly a vulnerable mess. He’s not even eating, is he?”
For some reason, it didn’t shock Andrew to realize they’d talk about him behind his back. He stared at another painting: brown-speckled pears next to cheese veined with rot, tiny white worms dangling from the perforated edges. It was unrepentantly gross, but somehow easier to focus on.
“I’m not…” Thomas trailed off and sighed. “You don’t understand anything.”
Lana huffed. “Dove told me enough. If you hadn’t hurt her—”
This made him shove away from the wall. “Ididn’thurt Dove. I’d never hurt her. And I’ll protect Andrew with my life.”
“Seems like you need to with all the creepy stuff going on in this school. Guess you don’t know anything about that?”
“No,” he snapped. “Sorry I don’t control the goddamn building and can’t stop it falling apart for Your Majesty’s convenience.”
There was a terse silence, both of them with dagger-expressions and tight jaws.
“The school,” Lana said, stiff and low, “isn’t the only thing falling apart. Don’t use him as a distraction from your nasty little inner monsters.”
Andrew slipped quietly away, his breath held, and he hoped they didn’t hear his footfalls on the carpet. He wanted to have never heard any of that, and he wanted to not think about what it meant.
He hid out next to the bathrooms until he saw Lana storm out of the narrow hallway, each step a staccato beat of righteous fury. A minute passed, then two, and when Thomas still didn’t emerge, Andrew backtracked and wound his way between the walls of putrefied paintings until he found Thomas sitting cross-legged under a gilt frame of a fruit bowl infested with beetles and spider eggs. He could almost taste the corruption under his tongue, the mold like a carpet of poison. Surely Wickwood hadn’t hung paintings like this on purpose, but he wasn’t sure if he was imagining their corruption or if this was an effect of what had escaped the forest last night.
A monster shaped like decay was crawling into the very bones of the school.
“Hey.” He kicked Thomas’s shoe lightly.
Thomas stayed where he was, glowering at the floor. Without any windows, the dusty light tarnished his hair to the color of old blood.
“If getting rid of my artwork doesn’t stop them,” he said, “the next step is obvious. I’m the creator. I’m the problem.”
A panicky feeling took hold of Andrew’s lungs, and healready didn’t want to hear the rest. “Maybe thatisthe answer. You are the artist. You drew them to life, so can’t you, like, I don’t know, draw their deaths?”
Thomas looked pained. “And while I’m doing that, you’re swinging the ax? I’m meant to fight the battles, not you.”
“Does it matter?” Andrew said softly.
“I have to protect you.” Thomas scrunched up his brow and scrubbed tiredly at his face. “That’s always how I’ve drawn us. Me, the prince with the sword, you the valiant storyteller.”
“We can’t kill monsters every night until we graduate. They’re getting worse. The Antler King was a freaking lot more to handle than thistle fairies.”
“I know.”
“What if,” Andrew said, “we killed them with ink?” He was rewarded with a blank stare, so he hurried on. “I mean, it makes sense, right? Control your art and then you control the monsters.”
“Maybe I can’t control them.”
“You have to try. We… I need you to try.”
